As I grow older I see minors more and more as children (which they are obviously) that I cannot relate to on a personal level. Even 18-21 year olds feel like adults in name only. I think that’s how you are supposed to feel though. I could never be friends with someone below 21 let alone date them. I have nothing in common! Edit: My phrasing made it sound like I didn’t think minors were kids.
im 18 and literally cant hang out with anyone younger than me besides one friend who is 6 months younger that i met before i was 18. all her friends are so immature and annoying (no shade, we all were once)! but i literally cannot fathom finding someone that much younger, let alone a CHILD attractive. its sick and i hope she can get out and find some respite
100 yrs ago it was fairly common. 200yrs ago, the norm. Short life expectancy probably a part of the reason. Necessity to support the family another part. Teenagers didn’t exist until 1946. You were a child, then you weren’t. Somewhere around 15. Maybe 13 for girls.
Yeah but Mormon guys are VERY emotionally stunted. Plus they go on a mission for 2 years. So I think they're fine. Both very immature and Mormon. Plus I'm sure her parents encouraged the relationship and the pregnancy. Mormons love that shit.
lol “Gays will ruin the sanctity of marriage.” “Huh. And what are you doing?” “Soft swinging with my husband’s best friend while he watches because we got married too young and don’t have any intimate feelings for one another.”
I’ve never once heard of anyone doing this before while a member of the LDS church. And if someone told me they were doing it, I’d know that they weren’t living the teachings taught. So, you’re watching people that don’t believe in the sanctity of marriage, but I do. People I know do. They exist, but the producers and most viewers aren’t interested in them.
@@daffodilfleur I was making a joke since it is rather frequent that the loudest voices against us are frequently hypocrites. In any case, I wholly reject the concept of a divine being of ANY benevolence, let alone complete and total, being opposed to an expression of love between two consenting adults. The person claiming it being a hypocrite is just sprinkles on the frosting on the cake in the ice cream cake that is my theological, moral, and ethical rejection of monotheism and Christianity in general.
@@daffodilfleur Yeah I bet. These girls kept it quiet till one of them dropped the bomb. If you don’t think a huge percentage of Mormons do things that don’t follow the values , then you’re naive…
Just click the little three dot drop-down next to the videos and say you're not interested, eventually you'll end up where I'm at, the only Mormon content I see is from Alyssa and people like her. 😂
I feel like it's important to highlight the power dynamic at play in Zac and Jen's marriage. She said that he comes from generations of surgeons and her mother is from Ecuador, doesn't speak English very well and is the custodian/janitor at the hospital where Zac's dad works. Zac also gambled away his medical school money. So she has to pay admission to be respectable in the eyes of others by putting up with his ish, paying his way through school, because this golden child chose to slum it with her. She will spend the rest of her life taking his crap and trying to prove that she is good enough. He will 1000% leave her for someone his parents approve of once he is an established doctor and try to screw her out of everything. He will also claim he pulled himself up by his bootstraps.
Thanks for bringing this up. I thought the same exact thing, sadly. She's a good girl... her husband sat there gambling her money while he criticized her mercilessly in Vegas. I was disgusted by him. Liked.
That comment “my Mom is a custodian in the hospital Zac’s Dad is a surgeon” blew me away. Something about a family with money like Zac’s allowing their son to gamble and use his wife’s money while claiming to be righteous and allowing her Mother to still work in that role at her age while they do the things they do… seems so wrong. But on the flip side, we have to acknowledge that Jen probably also feels a need to tie herself to a “legitimate” family with a good standing in the community because of not only her own upbringing and culture but also the culture she’s currently immersed in.
I like that you addressed the young age of the women in the show. I am flabbergasted by the fact that most of them are younger then me but in the cutscenes, they totally remind me of the classic TV show bored housewives in their mid 40s: using Botox and do other plastic surgeries, gossiping, cheating on each other, getting divorced... The religion really made them skip the typical young adulthood with getting education, meeting people, maybe travel if you have the money, and learning what you actually want in life.
I was definitely shocked too. Cause I'm 27 But for another reason more or less 😂 . It's common in Native American cultures now a days to be parents young. So non-Indigenous folk having kids in their 30s is what I'd expect to be the "norm" across most of the world Not... 16-19 😂 Like daaaang. Especially Jen!!!
Wait... She's the breadwinner, he's gambling her money away, and HE's threatening to divorce HER??? I feel sorry for her because divorce is obviously not what she wants, but really? That objectively sounds like an excellent way out of a toxic situation to me. I hope she has a prenup (probably not), but at least she has an income. (And no, the toxic situation is not that she's the breadwinner, but that he's a hypocritical P.O.S. with a bad temper.)
And now he wants to move to NY to go to med school and isolate her from her family and friends. Lord knows what he would do to her once she's fully isolated.
I think he’s assuming he’ll get most of what she has in the divorce including child support and alimony and he’s probably right considering the judge will probably be Mormon, as well. He’ll probably take the kids and immediately move on to another woman who will try to show him she’s "marriage material" by babysitting, cooking and cleaning and waiting on him hand and foot. That or he’ll dump his kids with his parents or leave them with her and go live his single college life indefinitely until his parents find out he’s no longer in school. Bc most likely he’s not going to succeed.
My grandma is LDS and was married at age 16 in the 1950s, and by age 17 was pregnant. I have talked with her about it and she has always said that while she doesn’t regret having children, she acknowledges that she was also a child having children and she said she would never wish that upon anyone. She was proud of me when I reached my 20s that I was still childless, I think that’s a part of her life she regrets, especially when she became older and realized she never had the freedom to do things we take for granted such as travel or go to school.
That wasn't only a result of being LDS; people had expectations of marrying much earlier and were able to marry earlier too, because it was possible to support a family on one income. The huge wealth concentration and transfer of income to skimmers and grifters was still well in the future. Also, birth control now compared with the horrible hateful way "fallen women" were treated. There was a baby-stealing industry in which girls were shuttled into homes for unwed mothers and then browbeaten into giving up their babies. You have many more choices than your grandma, right, plus considerably more pressure to get lots of education and bring in an income. And you had one or more children or plan to have one or more children when it's time.
Mormonism is a great example of how forcing people to suppress natural human behaviors and instincts is dangerous to mental health and happiness. You can't say you are in a good situation if you are constantly trying to find loopholes to get what you need.
"Between the botox and the laughing gas and the ketamine" is not a sentence I thought I'd hear today in relation to married mormon ladies, but apparently I shouldn't be so scandalized
I went to high school in a heavily Mormon area of southern Idaho. Many of my peers who were raised LDS followed the rules exactly, while a small percentage were smoking cigarettes, doing drugs, and hooking up (they would brag about it in class) A few were disowned by their families. In hindsight, I feel badly for them but I feel worse for the ones who didn’t/couldn‘t rebel against the overly restrictive (and cruel, imo) rules of the LDS church.
To be fair I do ketamine infusions for depression & anxiety. It seems that’s what they were referring to, but still bizarre it’s “allowed” if that makes sense. Not religious myself, but the Mormon culture definitely is confusing no matter what. 😂
That's exactly how I was feeling. I totally understand not drinking alcohol and not smoking especially for your health and wanting to treat your body well, but then doing all these other things like it's not doing the same thing. They talk about how "toxic" alcohol is but Botox is fine. Botox is short for botulinum toxin. A literal toxin. Make it make sense.
The wild thing is Mikayla was considered a "saint" but she said on a podcast she doesn't even identify as mormon anymore. And Demi the "sinner" says she does in fact have a current temple recommend. Lol
I think it was also who follows enough of the the known stereotypes Mikayla got married at 16 and has not gotten divorced Demi has a blended family and has drank alcohol
(not defending it, the age gap is gross regardless) but I do think Mikayla has posted something on her TikTok along the lines of her getting pregnant like a month after they met, no way to confirm of course but I think it actually did happen that way 😂
It is really hard to understand how women are supposed to be so traditional and modest in the LDS Church, but Botox and hair extensions are super popular.
Because both being traditional and modest and having surgeries to maintain your youthful appearance or look more conventionally feminine serves men. Its literally a religion for men and being served by submissive women
It basically becomes "keeping up with the Joneses and I must remain youthful" combination. And, of course, the women have an expectation of being perfect
I wonder if it has something to do with the lack of self agency they have in their lives. They have no or little choice in such big things like marriage and child birth. Their 'self-care' seems to be the only thing they have actual control over. Then the pressure of their peer group to look homogenous adds to those choices. Then, perhaps there is a strong pressure from men in the culture to remain "young" and do anything they can to "keep" him from straying. The whole thing is sociologically fascinating.
@@bri.b6448 agreed. I live in the south where we have lots of apostolic and Pentecostal churches. They are not allowed to cut their hair or wear makeup and jewelry. It is so interesting the fancy clothes and hair styles that they wear though. As a Christian, I find it fascinating to see how people interpret the Bible when it says to be modest.
@@elliemay1229 That is a really interesting point! The small choices that are granted to them are stretched to the limit-understandably. I am sad that they still only venture into what is allowed and deemed appropriate by the men that rule over them (women in high control religions). There is little variability in even the most "daring" of their limited choices.
About her domestic violence thing, i thought it was weird how on the show the neighbors said that they saw a woman trying to escape from the garage and her boyfriend wasn’t letting her out, also when the police came she described throwing the chair in self defense and they just arrested her the second she admitted to it and didn’t seem to look into Dakota that much after that. He also has so many red flags for abuse. And maci seems to think he’s abusing Taylor, but she keeps being forced to say she “might just be projecting her own trauma” because Dakota always tries to corner her, blame her for his relationship issues and overall use her as a scapegoat and drive a wedge between her and Taylor. I don’t think Taylor should have been the only one arrested
Utah dv laws is why she was arrested, there is no space for any discretion if someone damaged property during a domestic dispute they go to jail. It's not a great law cause it doesn't serve justice in every situation like this one.
I had the same thoughts while watching. She gets arrested, he walks free without even being brought in it seems like, and then he can take the moral high road because who cares what actually happened if you don’t have a criminal record. Not saying she’s innocent but it’s very he said she said, and of course they’ll go with his story
@@rebeccacampbell585that’s interesting, I hadn’t heard of that but it makes more sense as to why she was arrested now, doesn’t seem like an appropriate law tbh, leaves no room for nuance, such as if it was in self defense
Yea for real I was so that in that scene. She literally said he threw her in the garage and trapped her there and that she thought he was going to attack her when he tried to enter the garage himself, so she threw chairs at him. Like that fear is real too. But the show implied that she was drunk and delusional.
I am not Mormon and I went to college in Provo/ Orem and it was insane the “marriage advice” girls were giving to engaged women like “the first 3 months will be awful and painful, but you will get use to your husbands needs” “my marriage was really hard until I got on an anti depressant so maybe talk to your doctor about that now” “the church teaches you have to say yes to any request your husband has or how often he wants _ _ _ you might be uncomfortable with it but it is your responsibility to your husband and you will do it. It’s ok after a while” Like WHAT. This is not ok!
wait what… omg my gosh…. I am LDS and I could never. thank goodness I did not grow up in Utah BAHHAHA I grew up in california and live in the south now. wow. I cannot ew
Yeah and as someone who left the church in the typical “Mormon marriage age range” this was the kind of advice I was getting from my mom and older women in the church as young as 16-17. “Oh the first year of marriage is absolutely miserable but it’s ok you get through it” “if you can’t keep your room clean, that means you won’t keep your house clean, which means no man will ever want to marry you because you’re not a good homemaker.” Etc.
Ex-Mormon hedonist swinger here, this show was great. Also never do open relationships to try to save your relationship, it will just make the breakup more messy. Open relationships need to be either from the start, or after you have been together for 20 years and you're ride or d!e together lol
I say this all the time. My husband and I aren’t swingers or poly (but are non judgmental and open about a lot of stuff). I know poly couples who work great, but they entered that agreement mutually, and usually from the start. I’ve known others who did that to ‘save’ their relationship, and have never once seen that work.
@@jillsarah7356 I've heard that Buddhism (or at least the teachings) when taken to the extreme like it is in South Korea has a similar effect. There's videos out there that will explain it better than I, but it does contribute to the heavily misogynist/ generally terrible state of the culture
48:10 I really appreciate that you talked about how much power the producers and editors have to "create" villains out of people who don't even realize they're being cast as the villain. I saw an experiment in film class once where someone took raw footage of their friends and used it to edit together a drama that was manufactured entirely by the edit - the drama literally did not actually exist in the original footage. Which is not to say that I think Whitney is some sweet innocent girl who was turned into a villain solely through editing, but it's probably fair to assume that none of them really are who the show portrays them to be. Especially in the interview segments - it's WILD how misleading those can be. The producers ask these crazy hypotheticals like "Oh what would you do if you found out your husband was cheating on you?" and then use your answers, artfully cut to remove any evidence that it was a hypothetical question, and pretend like there's a dramatic storyline about how you think your husband is cheating. It's absurd, lol.
@@maryag213 If you were ‘genuinely’ curious you wouldn’t ask me but find out for yourself. It’s like the defining characteristic of the man. I actually do not believe you are as clueless as you pretend to be. Your motive… I actually couldn’t care less.
The Dakota edit is not an edit. He is creepy. He is inappropriate. He is scary. Taylor regularly sobs to be left alone. He thinks its an edit because he has no self awareness
Which is also why I think the DV *could* have been reactive abuse. He locked her in a garage, and she was screaming “get off of me.” How do you get someone away from you? You throw things at them.
@@Novjulyshe peed herself in fear (it sounds like from the police body cam), which again, seems more consistent when self defense than reactive abuse. This is coming from someone who is taking a lot of police enforcement and law heavy courses in college because im in school for forensic science. Like one of my courses is just about laws, how police and investigators need to act on the job, how to read a crime scene and the evidence, etc. That just really seems more like self defense. I wouldn’t call it abuse based on the evidence. It’s the Utah law that was why Taylor was arrested it seems.. if anyone damages property during a domestic dispute then they’re arrested, which makes them seem like the aggressor even if they weren’t.
As my mom tends to say, “the hallmark of human culture is to make an extreme number of ever more absurd rules, followed by even more absurd attempts at circumventing said rules”.
Yep, absolutely. I'm atheist and from a non religious family and looking at religion from the outside it just seems to meet the human need to control others. It's so much easier to do that to people people if it's clothed in spirituality of some sort.
I had an amazing theater teacher in college; went out of her way to get everyone’s pronouns right, was so sweet and fair and took what everyone was going through outside of class into consideration, always had fun outfits, and made class fun. Toward the end of the quarter she had mentioned that she’s Mormon, and we were all a bit surprised. She said that she has a child that’s part of the LGBTQ community and that God doesn’t make mistakes. I wish everyone that was Mormon could be more like her.
Did anyone else find it hilarious that when the girls would do their interviews the screen would flash their first name and age but for Jen it always included her last name 😂
Hey Alyssa! Just wanted to tell you that you are doing a great job. My sister is 18 and just turned in her mission papers, and i brought you up just now when you uploaded this and she got super uncomfy and said she doesnt wanna hear about you because shes seen some of your videos and you bring a bad spirit. Im 17 and have spent the past three years trying to deconstruct to the best of my ability as a queer youth being raised in a conservative mormon household. Your videos have really helped me understand the true history of the church and you have provided very good links to sources. Keep up the work! love watching the uploads. Finally gonna subscribe.
Sending support your way! Please know that there are people who will accept and celebrate you exactly as you are, whether your family is able to or not. You matter and I hope you always have the support you need and deserve!
1:20:48 he feels emasculated by the fact that his wife not only is the breadwinner, but is PUBLICLY the breadwinner, and he is turning that feeling of inadequacy into abuse.
@@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vj So you think that it was still okay to abuse her? You saying “but” when responding to someone mentioning abuse is not the smartest thing. She wasn’t touching anyone either. That was just unnecessary.
@@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vjshe didn't know where she was going since it was a surprise. When she found out she kept her distance. She then called him and told him about it and left. You CLEARLY have internalized so much misogyny that you are comfortable justifying abusive controlling and manipulative behavior. Seek help.
@@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vjis it the most beautiful thing to have a husband who is gambling away the household money that SHE earned? If he is so keen to have a ‘traditional’ marriage then he should also be the one earning money, supporting his family, paying all his wife’s expenses, etc. He wants a traditional good Mormon wife but he is also not taking on his role in that picture. And to be clear, I do not support the whole idea of strict gender roles being thrust on people, and I absolutely think Jen should be able to have her social media, earn money, etc, I am simply pointing out the hypocrisy.
Mayci actually has a sad back story. She got pregnant at 19 & her & her boyfriend were fighting & after she sent a text saying “have a good life” & he got in a car accident & passed away.. they cut that story from the show tho. & so she was going to be a single mom at 19 & has just lost her baby’s father. It’s so sad.
& I think that has a lot to do with her being such a good friend to everyone because she knows how it feels to lose someone when you are on bad terms 😊
I was born and raised in Utah as a black woman and this video was a 10/10 and I’m like really excited to watch your content. My bf jokingly always calls me Mormon and mentions Utah face all the time and a lot of the girls I went to hs with who still live in Utah seem be like well known influencers now so I’m like geeking over your channel rn
A friend went through something similar. She's not religious but stuck with her ex who left her and their kids upon his graduation and started a new life with the girlfriend it turned out he'd had for a while.
When they were discussing his getting accepted to med school in New York. She told him I don’t know if mom talk would still work if I was there and he said, “I don’t care” that just blew my mind! How can you not care when that is literally your livelihood. She’s the bread winner, she’s providing for your kids, she’s putting your through med school and you don’t care? Make that make sense.
It’s med school. You don’t turn down an acceptance so your spouse can keep making TikToks. She should have known what was in store when he started applying. It’s a whole-family decision
@@thecommentmonster I understand that but it was the blatant,” I don’t care” that was the issue. It wasn’t even a discussion about how are we going to make an income while one of us is in school. She’s taking care of their kids with those tik toks and as dumb as that sounds she makes good money doing it.
@@thecommentmonster He got accepted to multiple med schools include one much closer to UTAH (Arizona). That means he could still get an education while being in much closer proximity to her business and both of their families/support systems. She's arguably making hundreds of thousands a year through TikTok and social media if she is able to support their family and pay for his med school. His family gave them money to help with his medical school and he gambled it all away. She had to give him an allowance for his trip to Vegas of 2500 and he gambled with that as well until 2:30 in the morning while simultaneously admonishing her for getting dragged to a show. He doesn't want his life to be a whole family decision. He wants her to bend to his will and keep paying all the bills and raising the kids.
@@thecommentmonsterthen don't rely on your spouse's social media job to provide for you, your kids and tuition fees? Especially when you come from money and she comes from nothing?
Honestly, I just feel quite sad for all these women, because they clearly are struggling to find their identity and process their religious trauma. I wish them all luck!
But these women also are conservative bigoted hypocrites. They’ll say homosexuality is wrong and not allowed in their religion but it’s ok for them to be in open relationships? Utah is one of the most conservative states so I shouldn’t be surprised at the homophobia
Mormonism isn’t traumatic. Other than the priesthood issue, women are considered equal partners. UT was the second state to extend voting to women (only because they weren’t yet a state when the first state did it). The Relief Society is among the oldest women’s social organizations in the country. In a ‘to the letter of the gospel’ Mormon household they are absolutely equals to their husbands. Where you see deviation, their husbands are off the rules. Again, a much more common problem in UT and ID. Mormonism there has strayed quite far from the origins. Not in a good way.
@@f.kieranfinney457 how can you even say that when women arent allowed positions of power within the church. They arent allowed priesthood. The doctrine calls for men to be the spiritual leaders of the household. Not equals. Sexism is an integral part of their teachings.
@@f.kieranfinney457they are considered equal partners? They tell the women that they have to always be available to their husband's needs aka when he wants sex they have to have sex whether they want to or not. Idk if I'd consider that "equal partners"
I had no idea Mormon was considered a slur by the church. Not to be rude, but didn’t the LDS church have an entire “I’m a Mormon” campaign not that long ago? I swear this was a thing.
I dont think, the prophet understands what qualifies as a slur or not but then again, is it surprising? Not when we check the long and documented racist, sexist, queerphobic, etc. traditions of the Mormon church! 🙃
It's not a slur. Mormons use "Mormon" all the time. It's just a bug the current President Nelson got up his ass when he wanted everyone else to think Mormonism is a legitimate mainstream religion.
The Swig cup is killing me😂 I lived in Utah for 2 years, and Swig/SoDalicious mystified me. It made no sense to me that caffeine in soda form (with so much sugar and chemical additives) was okay, but coffee and tea are not. A Mormon acquaintance in Utah explained that “hot drinks” were what was forbidden… but they all drink hot chocolate 🤔. Non-sensical rules like these have made me even more critical of the faith than I was before my time in Utah.
Huh, I was raised mormon in Arizona, and the rule I was exposed to was about caffeinated drinks, not hot drinks. So that meant coffee, tea, and most sodas were off the table because caffeine is addictive.
@@packajackalope7419 you didn't learn hot drinks? Like what D&C literally says? "And again, hot drinks are not for the body or belly.". That's so weird. I've heard of people extending to also include all caffeine, but I've never heard someone say they weren't taught against hot drinks.
I grew up in Southern Idaho in the 1980s....and none of the Mormon kids I knew would dare with hot chocolate or any kind of chocolate and only grape or orange soda...they were all very terrified of going to Hell for caffiene. So this real shift is so confusing for me And I cam imagine my former classmates have had a hard time adjusting to the changes mentally
I feel like the soda thing changed when they bought a bunch of Pepsi shares. When I was young my Mormon friends weren't allowed to drink soda, but now they can. May have absolutely nothing to do with that, just thought it was an odd coincidence.
Whitney is clearly hypocritical, but the fact that she did ketamine and thinks shes still better than these other girls who are just drinking is CRAZY!
Ketamine makes people think they’re in the right and makes them act super preachy. I know someone who has a lot of connections to people who do drugs like that and that’s what he told me.
@@lynnefox4892therapeutic ketamine is pretty common especially out of the mainstream. It was and still is helpful to a lot of people especially during the pandemic. Unfortunatly I do not think narcissism and ketamine mix well. In a culture that takes any strong feeling as a personal revelation from God it can also be problematic.
What you got to towards the end was exactly what I picked up on, they seem like dramatic teenagers. It was shocking how young they all acted, but it makes sense because they haven’t had a chance to really grow up.
They did NOT invent the concept😂. Socialists and anarchists were the first ones to write about it, and the ones to coin the term "swinging", although Lord Byron and his coterie of rich English litterati were doing it before that. Also, people were documented doing it in medieval England because there was a hilarious loophole in the law that allowed men to put their wives up for auction and well...someone uncovered that the wives were having a grand old time. I think it's pretty safe to say that as long as there has been monogamy, there has been swinging in some form or other because most marriages were more about property and shiz than love.
Ex Mormon here. Although the origins of the religion were heavily influenced by polygamy, the religion has since then done a 180 and its actually VERY against the modern mormon culture. I think the show is just trying to get more views because people associate mormons and polygamy and don't understand the religious climate of today. So these swingers are actually looked down upon by most typical mormons. very interesting i think!
Swinging is huge out here (Im a NON-MORMON Utah native)! In one area it caused a lot of problems 😂😂😂😂 They would all get together and put their car keys in a hat. When the women started to pick other females keys the men got butt hurt and threw a temper tantrum. Caused lots of problems. Watching it all unfold was priceless!!! Utah is so messed up!
Zac just grosses me out. My ex used to get mad at me for doing things like going to have an after work cocktail with my girlfriends or even just going to dinner but the kicker was that he would get mad & use his “anger” as a way so that he could storm out to get wasted with other girls or go to strip clubs. Then he would blame me for making him do this. He would pick fights with me over things I did or people I dated when I was in highschool, literal years before I even met him. He would pretend to be grossed out by me bc I had a life before him but he also had a life before me and I never thought anything about it. I feel like Zac almost got mad at Jen as a way to stay out and gamble freely without feeling guilty or so she can’t get mad at him for spending a lot of money gambling.
My ex was exactly the same. I feel your pain gurl. One time he got ridiculously jealous of someone I met a couple times through uni (group assignment) because he had the same name as a guy I slept with 8 years prior. And he thought maybe that would entice me. And when I told him that his furious reactions were inappropriate and overblown, he said that I made him this way and wouldn't get to control his feelings now ✨ Funny how everything tracks
My ex would text me every half hour if I was out with friends, especially men. He would say “fine I’ll let you hang out with them” in a joking tone but it really wasn’t a joke. So glad you got out. In January it’ll be a year since I escaped.
I hope she wakes up and divorces him. He is not a good husband to her. I know she desperately wants to be a "Affleck" so she can say she is related to a movie star, but girl, it isn't worth it. 😅 I don't know how she can be friends with girls who all have amazing husbands and not realize how toxic her husband is.
Daughter of an ex-mormon here who has LDS siblings: I've always thought it was so wild how much plastic surgery and work LDS women get but when I make a pot of coffee and offer it to the whole room, they look at me as though I've just offered everyone heroine. 😂
Nooooo wayyyyy! One of them is the sick baby dancing mom?! I thought she looked familiar but I could have NEVER imagined it was her! That makes me a little upset honestly, that she grew to have such a platform. Yikes!
1:26:39 "You see them being mothers and I don’t know that all of them love to be mothers. They kinda had motherhood thrust upon them once they got married at 18 or younger." SO TRUE!! 😢🤯💔
At the 48min mark can we take a moment to acknowledge the bar for "a good mom" is on the floor for Mormons. Her mom was basically "I'll still love you even if you do something that doesn't affect me in any way except maybe embarrass me." And we all applaud her for it!
It’s not the bare minimum, it’s just a marker of a healthy relationship. So to have it, despite her religion being so important, shows us the way her mom balances her religion with her parenting. Nobody is saying she is a perfect mom because of that, it’s just an acknowledgment that she handled it well considering her own beliefs. I’m glass half full and you’re glass half empty though. Technically, it just depends on how you look at it here.
First time viewer/ new sub here: I really never thought I’d gravitate towards ex Mormon content but your breakdown of the drama, the show, these women’s story arch’s and how they do with or against the church is so well spoken and easily digestible. The way you speak scratches a serious itch in my English major brain- concise, but still with context, eloquent, intelligent and entertaining all in one. About to binge the rest of your vid’s now! x
As someone now living in an area with a large population of LDS followers I really felt what you said about Layla probably converting to fit in - and I so appreciate your regular reminders of why that is NOT a good idea
As a former Catholic and former Mormon (I've been through it lol) I always thought it was super interesting how Mormons more or less gatekeep being Mormon. Like Catholics do not care about your activity level or whatever, there are many different types of Catholics, but nobody is fighting to define who can bear that title. Mormons are very much into rules (like on my mission where our motto was "find more rules and obey them exactly") so if you are not following all of them then you lose the right to be Mormon/LDS. It's all or nothing
It’s a trip right?? I was raised Catholic and my husband was raised Mormon and the differences are fascinating! I do think a lot of the diversity (for lack of a better word) in Catholic practice is bc of how big and old it is. You just can’t control 1.3 billion people as easily as 6 million.
It is true that there is a lot of different types of Catholics but there is still a lot of guilt and shaming those who don't do things "correctly". At least in my experience within my family and extended family (so many different churches) there's a lot of shaming to those that don't go to church a certain amount of times, those who get divorced, and a lot of purity culture that has a ton of unwritten rules. I'm sure it's a lot less than how many extreme rules there are for Mormons though. There is definitely gatekeeping within Catholics too, probably to a much lesser degree.
Definitely weird. I was raised Catholic and I've always held the belief that as long as you are baptized in the church, you will always be Catholic (unless you choose to leave). Technically the Catholic religion is also very strict, but I think instead of gatekeeping like Mormons, we kind of go the other way, and anything goes. Like, I don't know anyone who waited til marriage, except maybe my grandma. Most "religious" Catholics I know might just encourage you to church, and will definitely tell you that God will always welcome you back when you're ready.
@@astridmystAs a Catholic, I was shocked to find out that other religions allow divorce! I remember this being a huge issue when my mom left my dad, my dad felt that he was committing a grave sin by signing the divorce papers even though he didn't have much of a choice. Not to mention, I have family members who remarried and weren't allowed to marry in the church the second time
I entirely agree. Each one resembles at least two others, and there is overlap between those clusters, so everyone looks like everyone else at least by two degrees of separation. Seems there is at least a bit of common facial structure in (at least the Anglo) LDS population.
As a never Mormon and a non-believer by middle school (I was taken to Sunday school and church services nearly every week until I left for college), your content fascinates me. The reasons people hold and follow religious doctrines is such a curiosity to me. I knew I loved your content from the beginning but when you stood in nature and asked/declared "Isn't this enough? This is enough.", I was forever hooked.💕 Looking forward to this one!🙂 Have a terrific weekend, Alyssa!✌️❤️
yeah not gonna lie, when they specified connor was talking to women on tinder, i fully went "huh???" 😂 especially because right before she said he was "sexually confused" but maybe thats just mormon talk for engaging in sex/sex content outside the confines of missionary with your spouse . or maybe she was lying because the only thing worse than a cheating husband is a gay cheating husband
My husband grew up Mormon and when I saw the show pop up on our Disney plus I made him watch it with me and then a lot of things started clicking into place with his family, so, at first I watched for funsies and then it was studing for dealing with his family lol 😂😂
It was so much better than I expected. I am in my early 30's and was born and raised in the SLC valley. My parents left the church before I was born. But most of my family and friends are LDS. There are so many things that were very relatable and I wasn't expecting that. Whitney's behavior is definitely very common for people around here. She can break every rule when she wants to and back stab and judge everyone. But how dare anyone point it out or judge her.
Your description of “I gave up enteral life for coffee” made me cackle so loud I instantly subscribed. I will deal with the algorithm giving me morman content for you! 😂❤
You are so right. All of the press photos of these women look like the same woman just with slightly different hair colours and styles. It’s kind of creepy and really bizarre. Oh yeah, what’s with the whole “living in Hawaii” thing before returning to Utah? I’ve watched various channels and have only realised they are Mormon after watching them for way too long 😳
Thank you for commenting on the show about a group of very unhealthy people living a toxic lifestyle in and around a high-demand cult. From my POV, the "beauty standard" depicted in the show is ghoulish, and I feel compassion for the girls and women who develop self-hatred as a result of growing up in this culture. It's too bad that the indoctrination blinds the women to the fact that, as the bread winners, they don't need to submit or even associate with their king-baby husbands, beyond court-ordered visitation arrangements. They'd be happier and healthier if they were single and supportive of each other.
... wasn't there a "I'm a Mormon" campaign a few years ago? At this point, I think it's safe to say that they're stuck with the consequences of their own choices.
Since it's establishment, the name of the church has always been the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "Mormon" is not a slur; it's just a nickname taken from the Book of Mormon. But a few years ago, members were instructed, and the media was asked, to use the proper name of the church. I think it's because a lot of people were confused about whether members of the faith were Christian or not. Using "Mormon" to describe members of the church today isn't derogatory, but it is indicative of the disconnect between the actual church and the media hype. Any respectable news outlet or documentary will use the proper name of the church.
Since @@cinderbelle22didn't answer your question, yes, there was a huge I'm a Mormon campaign for like a decade. The reason the name changed is because the current prophet tried to change the name in the 90s before he was prophet and was scorned by the prophet at that time. He waited literal decades to finally get back at him haha. Google something along the lines of "Gordon b Hinckley vs Russell M Nelson Mormon"
Yes but iirc the current prophet has a known history of hating the word Mormon so he made this change. It’s so petty that I don’t know how anyone can take it seriously. 😅
Licensed esthetician - “aesthetician” means nothing. Your esthetician shoukd NEVER be doing ANYTHING with nitrous oxide unless they are a nurse practitioner or a nurse under a doctors watch and insurance
Swinging is also very common in evangelicalism. My personal experience with it was in Pentecostalism, which is a similarly restrictive/extreme lifestyle to Mormonism, especially when it comes to purity culture. I went to an Xian school for 10 years growing up, and a friend of mine’s parents ended up divorcing because the husband left the wife for someone they were swinging with. They were definitely *not* the only swingers involved with the church/school.
Jack Mormon here, it means you get invited to all the parties you get to wear tank tops drink coffee and drink alcohol and you don't have to pay tithing it's the best Mormon to be if you are going to be Mormon.
I was 16 and married to a 21 year old mormon man in Arizona because my mother signed off on it, and then I couldn't get it annulled because I had a baby, couldnt get divorced for 7 years because he wouldn't sign
I'd be interested in finding the diabetes figures for Mormons. Instead of coffee, tea and beer they guzzle gallons of soda and tons of sugary cookies, etc.
Your analysis is by far the best I've heard. Why? Because you included the Mormon rules and standards that make a Mormon "worthy" (especially "temple worthy), in a typical ward, and showed that none of these women live up to those standards. I think this is a very important aspect that shouldn't be ignored, because if viewers think "this isn't sooo bad," or "they aren't culty at all," they need to know that this isn't representative of what it really is/was for most of us TBMs who did everything the leaders told us do, fearing that not doing so would mean losing out on the celestial kingdom, and losing our eternal families.
so many “reaction” and “analysis” videos of shows and things skim right over the top, thank you for going into depth and detail on the context and show, it goes a long way ❤
Yes! I love your videos Alyssa! I left a strict Christian cult years ago and I’m still sorting through how it affected me. Your videos have really helped me. Thank you for making these! ❤
Thank you for watching :) I've found it so helpful to learn from other people's stories, so I am really happy to hear my videos can do the same for others.
Watching this show + your recap as a Christian is so interesting. There are (obviously) spiritual parallels between Mormonism and Christianity, but the pipeline of strict faith to equally strict real life behavior in Mormonism seems outlandish to me😅 I’m as spiritually devout as Jen, but nowhere near as conservative. I just find it fascinating how differently Christians vs Mormons go about their daily lives.
Non Mormon but live in Utah and love your videos! My partner and I tried watching this show last night and only made it about 15 min in and realized it was a bit too drama-y for us. But I was still curious about all that happens in it so I’m glad you make this video!
That’s my feeling bout reality TV in general: too much drama and secondhand embarrassment! I find it all to be too much! Commentary like this is about as far as I can go.
Way to go Alyssa!! Thanks for reminding us that editing and directing any series can predetermine our own reactions to any character. Drama needs to be introduced for ratings. So thanks for pulling back the curtain on the basic techniques in which shows are produced. Nothing is without some bias. Each viewer will bring their own reaction to it.
As a lifelong Catholic from Latin America I just have to say this is fascinating. Utah must be one interesting place. Also, TH-cam now thinks I am a Mormon 😂😭 watching this has ruined my feed
Girl, I haven’t watched the show, and stumbled upon your video. That I watched, in its entirety. You SLAY, kept my attention the whole time, amazing job!
As a practicing Catholic I didn't love the way Jen made Catholic baptism sound super trivial. The process of baby baptism for Catholics is a serious thing. It's not in someone's living room. Also we drink alcohol - literally - as part of Mass. 😂😂😅
As an ex catholic, the idea of normie male family members (as opposed to priests) “blessing” the baby is silly. But there are lots of silly things that Catholics do too
@@32Theresai’ve never heard of anyone who’s not a priest blessing or baptizing anyone & it being considered valid in catholicism or even christianity as a whole
Right, her thinking a sacrament done by someone who studied theology at an accredited university for years with a master's degree at minimum, appointed by a bishop who most likely holds a ph d, is not more but less formal than a group hug by men, where the only requirement is being a man lmfaoooo 😂😂😂😂
I grew up in Gilbert, AZ which has a large LDS population (I lived across the street from the Gilbert temple lol) so watching this was WILD! The fact the allowed filming at the baby blessing was very interesting as well as the garment issue! Ugh I could watch 100 seasons this is anthropology.
The best, and really only, advice my mom gave me in regards to marriage was to never ever say the word Divorce, unless you really mean it. Don't carelessly throw it out in anger, frustration, or during a fight etc, because once you say it and put the idea out there, you can't take it back. I'm not saying divorce shouldn't be an option, but just throwing it around without appreciating the weight and gravity behind what it actually would mean is a very slippery slope and insidious thing to introduce into your marriage. It hurts my heart to see that one girls husband kinda toss around this idea of divorcing her when she does things he doesn't like. It's just not something you should weaponize against your spouse, the one person who you're supposed to love, protect, and cherish the most. My husband and I are by no means perfect, and no matter how hard we try we can still say things in anger that are most definitely unkind and below the belt at times, but that specifically is just something we promised eachother in the beginning that we wouldn't do, and honestly I think it really is the most simple but best advice I ever got.
It saddens me that these peoples lives are ruled by rules that have no real basis. I see so many people living disingenuous lives full of sadness...just because some guy looked at rocks in a hat and declared it. They live every moment just for the unpromised (and not even likely) chance that mormons are right and they'll go to the 💫🌟Celestial kingdom🌟. Instead of enjoying earth and all the beautiful things here, like coffee and normal underwear.
@@JanetFrisby-wl6zb you missed the point, hun. The point was that those strict rules are keeping people from having a perfectly fine life for no reason. There's nothing particularly beautiful in an average pair of panties or briefs, but if someone told me to spend a hot mid-summer day in basically two sets of clothes instead of just shirt, shorts and underwear, I'd start regard slim panties as a beautiful invention by the end of the day. And even in colder seasons, having the garments bunch up under regular clothes would drive a lot of people insane, even without the daily life stress. Like ... the beauty isn't in the things itself, but in how they impact your life. There's nothing "beautiful" about a clean, functioning toilet, but after spending a week on festival camping grounds you'll find yourself in awe of very basic things 😂
@Iamthatis137 I don't think they believe it. They are basically secular but don't drink alcohol. The underwear is not that big a deal. It's optional.
Almost every reality show is, in fact, scripted. Some have loose scripts where the situations are written beforehand and the participants have some liberty to decide how to follow through with the initial setup, some leave nothing to chance. The participants know that if they act reasonably and treat others kindly they will get little to no exposure after the editors choose the scenes to keep. Also, the participants usually have to sign non-disclosure agreements that will make them lose their houses if they disclose secrets. Get entertained, but do not believe a word of what is shown in a reality show.
Absolutely!! Almost everything is in reality TV is scripted, and a lot of time the film editors will completely scrap any apologies, reconciliations, or explanations to make people look even worse! 😳
lifelong athiest teen here! I love your videos (to the continued confusion of my generally atheist family and friends as i recite the problems of the Mormon church). Really loved watching the FLDS vid as well! Keep educating and having fun!
I live in a very secular country and all my family and friends are atheist (who also grew up atheist) and my favorite part of consuming this content is the confusion in people faces when I tell them about it 😂
This was one of the most thorough and well thought out videos about this show, I appreciate the effort you put into it! (Especially as someone who has no plans for watching it themselves)
I live in Utah, was born into a Mormon family but escaped via CPS, and live in Utah atm. This is the only way I'll be watching this 😂 Thank you for your sacrifice!
One thing as an exmo and former convert I never understood about garments was: where does the post partum pad go? And, by extension, where does the monthly pad (for those who use it) go? Getting pregnant was the thing that started the downline to my self excommunication lol
When I was active, I’d just stick the pad down where it would go in a pair of panties and hope for the best. With carinessa (the tighter-fitting polyester knit material) bottoms it worked okay, but if I wore drisilque (the silky, looser fit material), game over. The pad would be hanging down, rubbing between my thighs after a few minutes. It was SO uncomfortable. With either fabric I’d wind up getting blood on the bottoms no matter what I did. Garments made an already uncomfortable time even worse. I stopped wearing garments shortly after having my first baby. Two years later the feeling of normal underwear still makes me so very happy that I’m free.
As an autistic non mormon I can't even stomach the thought of having to wear long unbreathable polyester underwear under clothes and even during post pardum. That would be my personal hell.
@@juliannehannes11 I really can’t imagine how much worse it would be for someone with sensory issues. The day after I was endowed in the temple (the ceremony which starts a members’ garment-wearing life) I sat on the floor and cried and cried. I hated them so much; they were uncomfortable and I felt uglier than I’d ever felt. Not to mention the endowment ceremony was so creepy that all the warning sirens in my brain were going off, but the conditioning was forcing it away… anyway. I despise garments and feel so much resentment that I spent over a decade wearing them.
@@agentcallisto So you're not wearing the garments from childhood? I thought you were raised on the garments and it was all you knew. That's even more cruel, to go from normal underwear for 18yrs then suddenly to ill fitting long johns. I am so sorry. What do mormons with Eczema do? Do they have cotton garments?
the way zac immediately flipped out and started with threats against jen because of the chippendales show is a HUGE red flag 🚩I can’t imagine allowing my partner to talk to me like that… and she put his ass through school? girl, you need a sense of self worth, STAT
I think it’s often understated how someone rebelling against a religion this oppressive can really mean you lose your family, your entire community, everything you’ve known and be left alone with a child in a world you don’t know well without any support or connections. It’s such a complicated situation and these people are so young.
This is what I was thinking for most of the show. These women are so vulnerable to being cut off from all resources and support, idk why they are being told to rebel.
It KILLED me that everyone else's names in their talking heads said their first names and Jen's was Jen Affleck every time. We geeeeet it, gurl. It's really important to note, Chippendales is VERY different from a strip club. Also, note that Zac(h)(k) gambled away the school money his parents gave him. So it's not like he's just casually gambling. He clearly has a problem
Also, Jen did an interview with Vulture, published earlier this week, in which she says she and Zac have been in therapy since the show and "if this relationship continues....". Sounded to me like she's about 50-50 on the prospect now.
@@CorndogKatieyes! I saw Whitney as an atagonist but Zac and Dakota as actual villians. I felt like fleeing and saving the women everytime they were on screen
The law is they can legally be married as young as 14 in Utah with parental permission, but cannot legally consent to sexual acts until 16. At 16, they can legally consent to sexual acts with someone up to 6 years and 364 days their senior.
The fact that the conservatives keep screaming ‘protect the children’ from lgbtqia+ ‘groomers’ when so many states allow child marriages is so sickening
I learned so much through this video that I didn't get while watching the show, as I am not very familiar with LDS. I wondered what garments Jen forgot and just thought she didn't bring any clothes for the trip. 😅 Thank you very much for giving so much background information to really understand the show and the important issues it is adressing!
As someone who is 21 I cannot imagine being in relationships with someone who is 16/15. They are kids in my eyes
i feel the same way!
As I grow older I see minors more and more as children (which they are obviously) that I cannot relate to on a personal level. Even 18-21 year olds feel like adults in name only. I think that’s how you are supposed to feel though. I could never be friends with someone below 21 let alone date them. I have nothing in common!
Edit: My phrasing made it sound like I didn’t think minors were kids.
im 18 and literally cant hang out with anyone younger than me besides one friend who is 6 months younger that i met before i was 18. all her friends are so immature and annoying (no shade, we all were once)! but i literally cannot fathom finding someone that much younger, let alone a CHILD attractive. its sick and i hope she can get out and find some respite
100 yrs ago it was fairly common. 200yrs ago, the norm. Short life expectancy probably a part of the reason. Necessity to support the family another part.
Teenagers didn’t exist until 1946. You were a child, then you weren’t. Somewhere around 15. Maybe 13 for girls.
Yeah but Mormon guys are VERY emotionally stunted. Plus they go on a mission for 2 years. So I think they're fine. Both very immature and Mormon. Plus I'm sure her parents encouraged the relationship and the pregnancy. Mormons love that shit.
lol
“Gays will ruin the sanctity of marriage.”
“Huh. And what are you doing?”
“Soft swinging with my husband’s best friend while he watches because we got married too young and don’t have any intimate feelings for one another.”
This!
I’ve never once heard of anyone doing this before while a member of the LDS church. And if someone told me they were doing it, I’d know that they weren’t living the teachings taught. So, you’re watching people that don’t believe in the sanctity of marriage, but I do. People I know do. They exist, but the producers and most viewers aren’t interested in them.
@@daffodilfleur I was making a joke since it is rather frequent that the loudest voices against us are frequently hypocrites.
In any case, I wholly reject the concept of a divine being of ANY benevolence, let alone complete and total, being opposed to an expression of love between two consenting adults.
The person claiming it being a hypocrite is just sprinkles on the frosting on the cake in the ice cream cake that is my theological, moral, and ethical rejection of monotheism and Christianity in general.
@@daffodilfleur and? These people are in toxic relationships because of mormonism. That toxicity led to this.
@@daffodilfleur Yeah I bet. These girls kept it quiet till one of them dropped the bomb. If you don’t think a huge percentage of Mormons do things that don’t follow the values , then you’re naive…
New viewer here. The only downside to subscribing to your channel is that my youtube recommendations now have actual Mormon content
Haha I am so sorry to hear that 😭 silly algorithm can't tell you're not really here for that
Just click the little three dot drop-down next to the videos and say you're not interested, eventually you'll end up where I'm at, the only Mormon content I see is from Alyssa and people like her. 😂
😂😂😂😂 They actively look for new members any way they can. Just say "NNNNNOOOOO!!!!!!!! 😂😂😂😂
😂❤
Mine too😂
I feel like it's important to highlight the power dynamic at play in Zac and Jen's marriage. She said that he comes from generations of surgeons and her mother is from Ecuador, doesn't speak English very well and is the custodian/janitor at the hospital where Zac's dad works. Zac also gambled away his medical school money. So she has to pay admission to be respectable in the eyes of others by putting up with his ish, paying his way through school, because this golden child chose to slum it with her. She will spend the rest of her life taking his crap and trying to prove that she is good enough. He will 1000% leave her for someone his parents approve of once he is an established doctor and try to screw her out of everything. He will also claim he pulled himself up by his bootstraps.
Thanks for bringing this up. I thought the same exact thing, sadly. She's a good girl... her husband sat there gambling her money while he criticized her mercilessly in Vegas. I was disgusted by him. Liked.
She needs to leave him now to fend for himself.
That comment “my Mom is a custodian in the hospital Zac’s Dad is a surgeon” blew me away. Something about a family with money like Zac’s allowing their son to gamble and use his wife’s money while claiming to be righteous and allowing her Mother to still work in that role at her age while they do the things they do… seems so wrong. But on the flip side, we have to acknowledge that Jen probably also feels a need to tie herself to a “legitimate” family with a good standing in the community because of not only her own upbringing and culture but also the culture she’s currently immersed in.
Literally
Unfortunately this is extremely common in a culture where men have all the power and women are taught to be subservient.
I like that you addressed the young age of the women in the show. I am flabbergasted by the fact that most of them are younger then me but in the cutscenes, they totally remind me of the classic TV show bored housewives in their mid 40s: using Botox and do other plastic surgeries, gossiping, cheating on each other, getting divorced... The religion really made them skip the typical young adulthood with getting education, meeting people, maybe travel if you have the money, and learning what you actually want in life.
I was definitely shocked too. Cause I'm 27
But for another reason more or less 😂 . It's common in Native American cultures now a days to be parents young. So non-Indigenous folk having kids in their 30s is what I'd expect to be the "norm" across most of the world
Not...
16-19 😂
Like daaaang. Especially Jen!!!
Wait... She's the breadwinner, he's gambling her money away, and HE's threatening to divorce HER???
I feel sorry for her because divorce is obviously not what she wants, but really? That objectively sounds like an excellent way out of a toxic situation to me. I hope she has a prenup (probably not), but at least she has an income.
(And no, the toxic situation is not that she's the breadwinner, but that he's a hypocritical P.O.S. with a bad temper.)
And now he wants to move to NY to go to med school and isolate her from her family and friends. Lord knows what he would do to her once she's fully isolated.
Plus he gambled away money that his parents gave them to cover some expenses while he was in college/med school. I wonder if he parents know.
I think he’s assuming he’ll get most of what she has in the divorce including child support and alimony and he’s probably right considering the judge will probably be Mormon, as well. He’ll probably take the kids and immediately move on to another woman who will try to show him she’s "marriage material" by babysitting, cooking and cleaning and waiting on him hand and foot. That or he’ll dump his kids with his parents or leave them with her and go live his single college life indefinitely until his parents find out he’s no longer in school. Bc most likely he’s not going to succeed.
I'm starting to understand why there are so many Mormon women murder their husbands....
They actually moved to Arizona. They didn't end up going to NYC.
My grandma is LDS and was married at age 16 in the 1950s, and by age 17 was pregnant. I have talked with her about it and she has always said that while she doesn’t regret having children, she acknowledges that she was also a child having children and she said she would never wish that upon anyone. She was proud of me when I reached my 20s that I was still childless, I think that’s a part of her life she regrets, especially when she became older and realized she never had the freedom to do things we take for granted such as travel or go to school.
No shite
Are you my sibling or cousin? Because my grandma ALSO got married at 16 and pregnant at 17 in the 1950s.
After WW2 a lot of women became young moms. But 17… is a girl child. So sad.
That wasn't only a result of being LDS; people had expectations of marrying much earlier and were able to marry earlier too, because it was possible to support a family on one income. The huge wealth concentration and transfer of income to skimmers and grifters was still well in the future.
Also, birth control now compared with the horrible hateful way "fallen women" were treated. There was a baby-stealing industry in which girls were shuttled into homes for unwed mothers and then browbeaten into giving up their babies.
You have many more choices than your grandma, right, plus considerably more pressure to get lots of education and bring in an income. And you had one or more children or plan to have one or more children when it's time.
@@ballasogYcG😅😊
Whitney’s husband did not have a Tinder account, he had a Grindr account.
well that just got way more interesting!
Bet they say their is a loophole for that as well
I was def watching that show screaming “YOUR HUSBAND IS GAY”
I KNEW IT. This is kinda rude but the hair gave him away💀
@@Tiorg-g1uthe hairline, the jawline, the voice, the demeanor
Mormonism is a great example of how forcing people to suppress natural human behaviors and instincts is dangerous to mental health and happiness. You can't say you are in a good situation if you are constantly trying to find loopholes to get what you need.
Yup! Utah Vallet weather s nicknamed "happy valley" for a reason (anti-depressents)
I agree!! 💯
As someone with some face blindness, this show sounds like actual torture to watch
I watched one episode, and this show made me feel like someone with face blindness. They should make them wear signature colors or something.
I want to see Julien Solomita watch this show and try to tell the differences between them all
the names are put in real often tough
"Between the botox and the laughing gas and the ketamine" is not a sentence I thought I'd hear today in relation to married mormon ladies, but apparently I shouldn't be so scandalized
I'm an absolute outsider to this and I'm just sitting here like 😮
I went to high school in a heavily Mormon area of southern Idaho. Many of my peers who were raised LDS followed the rules exactly, while a small percentage were smoking cigarettes, doing drugs, and hooking up (they would brag about it in class) A few were disowned by their families. In hindsight, I feel badly for them but I feel worse for the ones who didn’t/couldn‘t rebel against the overly restrictive (and cruel, imo) rules of the LDS church.
To be fair I do ketamine infusions for depression & anxiety. It seems that’s what they were referring to, but still bizarre it’s “allowed” if that makes sense. Not religious myself, but the Mormon culture definitely is confusing no matter what. 😂
That's exactly how I was feeling. I totally understand not drinking alcohol and not smoking especially for your health and wanting to treat your body well, but then doing all these other things like it's not doing the same thing. They talk about how "toxic" alcohol is but Botox is fine. Botox is short for botulinum toxin. A literal toxin. Make it make sense.
@@veronicastoecker4521 AND they're essentially doing whippets while getting botox injections 💀
The wild thing is Mikayla was considered a "saint" but she said on a podcast she doesn't even identify as mormon anymore. And Demi the "sinner" says she does in fact have a current temple recommend. Lol
That's just reality TV in general. The edit has way more power than people realise in controlling the narrative.
@@AlbinojackrusselI think, the idea of the divide was caused by who Zach and Jen didnt invite to their baby's blessing.
I think the Not Divorced point was more important than being active in the church
I think it was also who follows enough of the the known stereotypes
Mikayla got married at 16 and has not gotten divorced
Demi has a blended family and has drank alcohol
This is how i read it too.@MsMaddieTheOdd
If they got married at 16...and she was already pregnant, they didnt just meet and bang, she was probably 15 when they got together. Foul
That the math continues to get more horrifying...
(not defending it, the age gap is gross regardless) but I do think Mikayla has posted something on her TikTok along the lines of her getting pregnant like a month after they met, no way to confirm of course but I think it actually did happen that way 😂
Yeah she got groomed
Oh wow.. that’s so depressing to think about
Yeah: whether it's legal or not, culturally accepted in her community or not - it's wrong.
It is really hard to understand how women are supposed to be so traditional and modest in the LDS Church, but Botox and hair extensions are super popular.
Because both being traditional and modest and having surgeries to maintain your youthful appearance or look more conventionally feminine serves men. Its literally a religion for men and being served by submissive women
It basically becomes "keeping up with the Joneses and I must remain youthful" combination. And, of course, the women have an expectation of being perfect
I wonder if it has something to do with the lack of self agency they have in their lives. They have no or little choice in such big things like marriage and child birth.
Their 'self-care' seems to be the only thing they have actual control over. Then the pressure of their peer group to look homogenous adds to those choices. Then, perhaps there is a strong pressure from men in the culture to remain "young" and do anything they can to "keep" him from straying.
The whole thing is sociologically fascinating.
@@bri.b6448 agreed. I live in the south where we have lots of apostolic and Pentecostal churches. They are not allowed to cut their hair or wear makeup and jewelry. It is so interesting the fancy clothes and hair styles that they wear though. As a Christian, I find it fascinating to see how people interpret the Bible when it says to be modest.
@@elliemay1229 That is a really interesting point! The small choices that are granted to them are stretched to the limit-understandably. I am sad that they still only venture into what is allowed and deemed appropriate by the men that rule over them (women in high control religions). There is little variability in even the most "daring" of their limited choices.
About her domestic violence thing, i thought it was weird how on the show the neighbors said that they saw a woman trying to escape from the garage and her boyfriend wasn’t letting her out, also when the police came she described throwing the chair in self defense and they just arrested her the second she admitted to it and didn’t seem to look into Dakota that much after that. He also has so many red flags for abuse. And maci seems to think he’s abusing Taylor, but she keeps being forced to say she “might just be projecting her own trauma” because Dakota always tries to corner her, blame her for his relationship issues and overall use her as a scapegoat and drive a wedge between her and Taylor. I don’t think Taylor should have been the only one arrested
Utah dv laws is why she was arrested, there is no space for any discretion if someone damaged property during a domestic dispute they go to jail. It's not a great law cause it doesn't serve justice in every situation like this one.
I had the same thoughts while watching. She gets arrested, he walks free without even being brought in it seems like, and then he can take the moral high road because who cares what actually happened if you don’t have a criminal record. Not saying she’s innocent but it’s very he said she said, and of course they’ll go with his story
@@rebeccacampbell585that’s interesting, I hadn’t heard of that but it makes more sense as to why she was arrested now, doesn’t seem like an appropriate law tbh, leaves no room for nuance, such as if it was in self defense
I just feel like the fact that she peed herself during the confrontation says so much about how afraid she was in that moment
Yea for real I was so that in that scene. She literally said he threw her in the garage and trapped her there and that she thought he was going to attack her when he tried to enter the garage himself, so she threw chairs at him. Like that fear is real too. But the show implied that she was drunk and delusional.
I am not Mormon and I went to college in Provo/ Orem and it was insane the “marriage advice” girls were giving to engaged women like “the first 3 months will be awful and painful, but you will get use to your husbands needs” “my marriage was really hard until I got on an anti depressant so maybe talk to your doctor about that now” “the church teaches you have to say yes to any request your husband has or how often he wants _ _ _ you might be uncomfortable with it but it is your responsibility to your husband and you will do it. It’s ok after a while”
Like WHAT. This is not ok!
No, it is not!!!
Maybe that is why the "Sister Wives" wanted a plural marriage. They could get a break from Cody.
wait what… omg my gosh….
I am LDS and I could never. thank goodness I did not grow up in Utah BAHHAHA I grew up in california and live in the south now.
wow. I cannot ew
Yeah and as someone who left the church in the typical “Mormon marriage age range” this was the kind of advice I was getting from my mom and older women in the church as young as 16-17. “Oh the first year of marriage is absolutely miserable but it’s ok you get through it” “if you can’t keep your room clean, that means you won’t keep your house clean, which means no man will ever want to marry you because you’re not a good homemaker.” Etc.
Its awful i tried to be gentle when i told a friend ger husband raped her, that that was rape. Apparently im Lilith Spawn and trying to eat her baby.
Ex-Mormon hedonist swinger here, this show was great. Also never do open relationships to try to save your relationship, it will just make the breakup more messy. Open relationships need to be either from the start, or after you have been together for 20 years and you're ride or d!e together lol
The number of people who think SWINGING will save their relationship is sooooo crazy but I think people just don't want to get divorced :/
I say this all the time. My husband and I aren’t swingers or poly (but are non judgmental and open about a lot of stuff). I know poly couples who work great, but they entered that agreement mutually, and usually from the start. I’ve known others who did that to ‘save’ their relationship, and have never once seen that work.
Mormons think being gay is wrong but they think open relationships are ok? Conservatives are wild. The homophobia is real
Mormons think it’s ok to break every rule unless you’re gay. Heterosexual open relationships are ok but being gay isn’t? Conservatives make no sense
Hedonist? You do you! I mean that, I mind my own damned business. As an exmo I prefer an Epicurean lifestyle, though.
I feel like 90% of the history of religion could be summed up as “man takes time out of willing sin to berate woman for unwilling sin”
You meant *Christianity not religion. Buddhism and Native American religions are also organized religions
@@jillsarah7356 no I definitely meant all religion. Thanks!
@jillsarah7356 who are the leaders of that religion? if its mostly men, then its not looking good for their opinion of women.
@@jillsarah7356 Westerners once again, infantizing and ftshizing other ethnicities’ religions because they never left their sheltered bubble…
@@jillsarah7356 I've heard that Buddhism (or at least the teachings) when taken to the extreme like it is in South Korea has a similar effect. There's videos out there that will explain it better than I, but it does contribute to the heavily misogynist/ generally terrible state of the culture
I did not realize the woman dancing next to her baby in the hospital was Mormon. Adds a whole other level of lore to what was already a batshit story
Which mom was it? I'm so invested in this...
@@evelinajauniskyte9557 It was Whitney, of course😂
48:10 I really appreciate that you talked about how much power the producers and editors have to "create" villains out of people who don't even realize they're being cast as the villain. I saw an experiment in film class once where someone took raw footage of their friends and used it to edit together a drama that was manufactured entirely by the edit - the drama literally did not actually exist in the original footage. Which is not to say that I think Whitney is some sweet innocent girl who was turned into a villain solely through editing, but it's probably fair to assume that none of them really are who the show portrays them to be. Especially in the interview segments - it's WILD how misleading those can be. The producers ask these crazy hypotheticals like "Oh what would you do if you found out your husband was cheating on you?" and then use your answers, artfully cut to remove any evidence that it was a hypothetical question, and pretend like there's a dramatic storyline about how you think your husband is cheating. It's absurd, lol.
4:54 Joseph Smith was the OG ‘loopholes for horny reasons’ maker so his followers being good at it is not surprising.
@@noeraldinkabam 🙌🏼 😂 Love this!!! Great observation! 💗🫶🏼💗
Tbh it's the most understandable part of the religion 😅 no better reason for a loophole than horny reasons
Henry the 8th has to be the OG but JSmith definitely samples the mix!!!
Could you give examples of this? I’m genuinely curious!
@@maryag213 If you were ‘genuinely’ curious you wouldn’t ask me but find out for yourself. It’s like the defining characteristic of the man. I actually do not believe you are as clueless as you pretend to be. Your motive… I actually couldn’t care less.
The Dakota edit is not an edit. He is creepy. He is inappropriate. He is scary. Taylor regularly sobs to be left alone. He thinks its an edit because he has no self awareness
He scares me.
Which is also why I think the DV *could* have been reactive abuse. He locked her in a garage, and she was screaming “get off of me.” How do you get someone away from you? You throw things at them.
@@Novjulyumm.. that’s not reactive abuse at all. That’s self defense..
@@Novjulyshe peed herself in fear (it sounds like from the police body cam), which again, seems more consistent when self defense than reactive abuse. This is coming from someone who is taking a lot of police enforcement and law heavy courses in college because im in school for forensic science. Like one of my courses is just about laws, how police and investigators need to act on the job, how to read a crime scene and the evidence, etc.
That just really seems more like self defense. I wouldn’t call it abuse based on the evidence. It’s the Utah law that was why Taylor was arrested it seems.. if anyone damages property during a domestic dispute then they’re arrested, which makes them seem like the aggressor even if they weren’t.
As my mom tends to say, “the hallmark of human culture is to make an extreme number of ever more absurd rules, followed by even more absurd attempts at circumventing said rules”.
I like your mom. Good pragmatic worldview
Yep, absolutely. I'm atheist and from a non religious family and looking at religion from the outside it just seems to meet the human need to control others. It's so much easier to do that to people people if it's clothed in spirituality of some sort.
I had an amazing theater teacher in college; went out of her way to get everyone’s pronouns right, was so sweet and fair and took what everyone was going through outside of class into consideration, always had fun outfits, and made class fun. Toward the end of the quarter she had mentioned that she’s Mormon, and we were all a bit surprised. She said that she has a child that’s part of the LGBTQ community and that God doesn’t make mistakes. I wish everyone that was Mormon could be more like her.
Did anyone else find it hilarious that when the girls would do their interviews the screen would flash their first name and age but for Jen it always included her last name 😂
Hey Alyssa! Just wanted to tell you that you are doing a great job. My sister is 18 and just turned in her mission papers, and i brought you up just now when you uploaded this and she got super uncomfy and said she doesnt wanna hear about you because shes seen some of your videos and you bring a bad spirit. Im 17 and have spent the past three years trying to deconstruct to the best of my ability as a queer youth being raised in a conservative mormon household. Your videos have really helped me understand the true history of the church and you have provided very good links to sources. Keep up the work! love watching the uploads. Finally gonna subscribe.
I wish you all the best on your journey, and hope you have or are able to find a support system of people who are there for you when you need them.
Sending support your way! Please know that there are people who will accept and celebrate you exactly as you are, whether your family is able to or not. You matter and I hope you always have the support you need and deserve!
I wish you the best future. You are doing well to stop believing.
🏳️🌈❤
It gets easier the longer you’re out of it🩷 I hope you have support!
1:20:48 he feels emasculated by the fact that his wife not only is the breadwinner, but is PUBLICLY the breadwinner, and he is turning that feeling of inadequacy into abuse.
Yeah, but I think that is not the most beautiful thing have a wife that is touching other men and going to this kind of clubs
@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vj she wasn't touching anyone, and was at the Chippendale show under protest.
@@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vj
So you think that it was still okay to abuse her? You saying “but” when responding to someone mentioning abuse is not the smartest thing. She wasn’t touching anyone either. That was just unnecessary.
@@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vjshe didn't know where she was going since it was a surprise. When she found out she kept her distance. She then called him and told him about it and left. You CLEARLY have internalized so much misogyny that you are comfortable justifying abusive controlling and manipulative behavior. Seek help.
@@JuanDiegoHernandezRojas-hk3vjis it the most beautiful thing to have a husband who is gambling away the household money that SHE earned?
If he is so keen to have a ‘traditional’ marriage then he should also be the one earning money, supporting his family, paying all his wife’s expenses, etc. He wants a traditional good Mormon wife but he is also not taking on his role in that picture. And to be clear, I do not support the whole idea of strict gender roles being thrust on people, and I absolutely think Jen should be able to have her social media, earn money, etc, I am simply pointing out the hypocrisy.
Mayci actually has a sad back story. She got pregnant at 19 & her & her boyfriend were fighting & after she sent a text saying “have a good life” & he got in a car accident & passed away.. they cut that story from the show tho. & so she was going to be a single mom at 19 & has just lost her baby’s father. It’s so sad.
& I think that has a lot to do with her being such a good friend to everyone because she knows how it feels to lose someone when you are on bad terms 😊
Perhaps God's judgement??
@@marinemarine8305eww
@@marinemarine8305fuck you for saying that. That’s so cruel.
@@marinemarine8305Absolutely disgusting thing to say. Do better.
I was born and raised in Utah as a black woman and this video was a 10/10 and I’m like really excited to watch your content. My bf jokingly always calls me Mormon and mentions Utah face all the time and a lot of the girls I went to hs with who still live in Utah seem be like well known influencers now so I’m like geeking over your channel rn
How was it? I am black but not In the US or AA.... But I wonder were they mean /racist??
1:30:05 This video is NOT too long, I gobbled it all up so fast! Can't wait for season 2 and your analysis!
He is going to have Jen pay for his schooling and then divorce her once he is set up with his career
Wish someone would tell her that
I wasnt going to write it but you took it out of my head
A friend went through something similar. She's not religious but stuck with her ex who left her and their kids upon his graduation and started a new life with the girlfriend it turned out he'd had for a while.
When they were discussing his getting accepted to med school in New York. She told him I don’t know if mom talk would still work if I was there and he said, “I don’t care” that just blew my mind! How can you not care when that is literally your livelihood. She’s the bread winner, she’s providing for your kids, she’s putting your through med school and you don’t care? Make that make sense.
It’s med school. You don’t turn down an acceptance so your spouse can keep making TikToks. She should have known what was in store when he started applying. It’s a whole-family decision
I agree with you. The way he completely dismissed her was so awful.
@@thecommentmonster I understand that but it was the blatant,” I don’t care” that was the issue. It wasn’t even a discussion about how are we going to make an income while one of us is in school. She’s taking care of their kids with those tik toks and as dumb as that sounds she makes good money doing it.
@@thecommentmonster He got accepted to multiple med schools include one much closer to UTAH (Arizona). That means he could still get an education while being in much closer proximity to her business and both of their families/support systems. She's arguably making hundreds of thousands a year through TikTok and social media if she is able to support their family and pay for his med school. His family gave them money to help with his medical school and he gambled it all away. She had to give him an allowance for his trip to Vegas of 2500 and he gambled with that as well until 2:30 in the morning while simultaneously admonishing her for getting dragged to a show. He doesn't want his life to be a whole family decision. He wants her to bend to his will and keep paying all the bills and raising the kids.
@@thecommentmonsterthen don't rely on your spouse's social media job to provide for you, your kids and tuition fees? Especially when you come from money and she comes from nothing?
Honestly, I just feel quite sad for all these women, because they clearly are struggling to find their identity and process their religious trauma. I wish them all luck!
Nicely put!
But these women also are conservative bigoted hypocrites. They’ll say homosexuality is wrong and not allowed in their religion but it’s ok for them to be in open relationships? Utah is one of the most conservative states so I shouldn’t be surprised at the homophobia
Mormonism isn’t traumatic. Other than the priesthood issue, women are considered equal partners. UT was the second state to extend voting to women (only because they weren’t yet a state when the first state did it). The Relief Society is among the oldest women’s social organizations in the country.
In a ‘to the letter of the gospel’ Mormon household they are absolutely equals to their husbands. Where you see deviation, their husbands are off the rules.
Again, a much more common problem in UT and ID. Mormonism there has strayed quite far from the origins. Not in a good way.
@@f.kieranfinney457 how can you even say that when women arent allowed positions of power within the church. They arent allowed priesthood. The doctrine calls for men to be the spiritual leaders of the household. Not equals. Sexism is an integral part of their teachings.
@@f.kieranfinney457they are considered equal partners? They tell the women that they have to always be available to their husband's needs aka when he wants sex they have to have sex whether they want to or not. Idk if I'd consider that "equal partners"
That fool ain’t even in med school how the show calls him a med student is beyond me 😂✋🏼
Why does Zac give me a Mormon Jake Paul energy with a Gary Busey face
Bc it is
Lmfao
God damn that's a deep cut. Might need to go to the hospital for that.
I had no idea Mormon was considered a slur by the church. Not to be rude, but didn’t the LDS church have an entire “I’m a Mormon” campaign not that long ago? I swear this was a thing.
Your right. There was an I'm a mormon campaign before Nelson became prophet. I'm using the word more often now than ever (could it be rebellion?).
Yes, yes they did. They pretty much flipped on this overnight.
I dont think, the prophet understands what qualifies as a slur or not but then again, is it surprising? Not when we check the long and documented racist, sexist, queerphobic, etc. traditions of the Mormon church!
🙃
It's not a slur. Mormons use "Mormon" all the time. It's just a bug the current President Nelson got up his ass when he wanted everyone else to think Mormonism is a legitimate mainstream religion.
@@moustik31 Excellent point. 👍
The Swig cup is killing me😂 I lived in Utah for 2 years, and Swig/SoDalicious mystified me. It made no sense to me that caffeine in soda form (with so much sugar and chemical additives) was okay, but coffee and tea are not. A Mormon acquaintance in Utah explained that “hot drinks” were what was forbidden… but they all drink hot chocolate 🤔. Non-sensical rules like these have made me even more critical of the faith than I was before my time in Utah.
So iced coffee is fine then. It's just another method of control.😂
Huh, I was raised mormon in Arizona, and the rule I was exposed to was about caffeinated drinks, not hot drinks. So that meant coffee, tea, and most sodas were off the table because caffeine is addictive.
@@packajackalope7419 you didn't learn hot drinks? Like what D&C literally says? "And again, hot drinks are not for the body or belly.". That's so weird. I've heard of people extending to also include all caffeine, but I've never heard someone say they weren't taught against hot drinks.
I grew up in Southern Idaho in the 1980s....and none of the Mormon kids I knew would dare with hot chocolate or any kind of chocolate and only grape or orange soda...they were all very terrified of going to Hell for caffiene. So this real shift is so confusing for me
And I cam imagine my former classmates have had a hard time adjusting to the changes mentally
I feel like the soda thing changed when they bought a bunch of Pepsi shares. When I was young my Mormon friends weren't allowed to drink soda, but now they can. May have absolutely nothing to do with that, just thought it was an odd coincidence.
Whitney is clearly hypocritical, but the fact that she did ketamine and thinks shes still better than these other girls who are just drinking is CRAZY!
Ketamine makes people think they’re in the right and makes them act super preachy. I know someone who has a lot of connections to people who do drugs like that and that’s what he told me.
Yeah I don’t believe that was her first taste of champagne at the beginning either.
@@Livi-i8e Elon Musk being Exhibit A.
@@lynnefox4892therapeutic ketamine is pretty common especially out of the mainstream. It was and still is helpful to a lot of people especially during the pandemic. Unfortunatly I do not think narcissism and ketamine mix well. In a culture that takes any strong feeling as a personal revelation from God it can also be problematic.
@@malloryharding882It definitely wasn’t, that reaction was too overblown for champagne of all things😂
What you got to towards the end was exactly what I picked up on, they seem like dramatic teenagers. It was shocking how young they all acted, but it makes sense because they haven’t had a chance to really grow up.
Considering how young they were when they got married, I'm not surprised
21:48 i'm 21 currently and I can't IMAGINE in any way looking at a 16-year-old and seeing them as an equal in that way...
Are we really surprised that "swinging" comes out of a culture with origins in polygamy?
They did NOT invent the concept😂. Socialists and anarchists were the first ones to write about it, and the ones to coin the term "swinging", although Lord Byron and his coterie of rich English litterati were doing it before that. Also, people were documented doing it in medieval England because there was a hilarious loophole in the law that allowed men to put their wives up for auction and well...someone uncovered that the wives were having a grand old time. I think it's pretty safe to say that as long as there has been monogamy, there has been swinging in some form or other because most marriages were more about property and shiz than love.
I’m not
Ex Mormon here. Although the origins of the religion were heavily influenced by polygamy, the religion has since then done a 180 and its actually VERY against the modern mormon culture. I think the show is just trying to get more views because people associate mormons and polygamy and don't understand the religious climate of today. So these swingers are actually looked down upon by most typical mormons. very interesting i think!
@@alexandraloftin2226Yeah, the producer for the show itself said he created it to change people's views and opinions on the church
Swinging is huge out here (Im a NON-MORMON Utah native)! In one area it caused a lot of problems 😂😂😂😂
They would all get together and put their car keys in a hat. When the women started to pick other females keys the men got butt hurt and threw a temper tantrum. Caused lots of problems. Watching it all unfold was priceless!!!
Utah is so messed up!
They really can't handle women enjoying themselves, can they?
So instead of the Joseph Smith "stone in the hat" decision they made a "keys in the hat" decision 🤣🎩🔑
@@josiemaromi6981 brilliant! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Mormon is a demon, so no wonder this is happening 🥲
So what is. Are mormons polygamous or swingers
Seems like this page can't decide what they are.
What is your body count before you judge
Zac just grosses me out. My ex used to get mad at me for doing things like going to have an after work cocktail with my girlfriends or even just going to dinner but the kicker was that he would get mad & use his “anger” as a way so that he could storm out to get wasted with other girls or go to strip clubs. Then he would blame me for making him do this. He would pick fights with me over things I did or people I dated when I was in highschool, literal years before I even met him. He would pretend to be grossed out by me bc I had a life before him but he also had a life before me and I never thought anything about it. I feel like Zac almost got mad at Jen as a way to stay out and gamble freely without feeling guilty or so she can’t get mad at him for spending a lot of money gambling.
He sounds like a narcissist
My ex was exactly the same. I feel your pain gurl.
One time he got ridiculously jealous of someone I met a couple times through uni (group assignment) because he had the same name as a guy I slept with 8 years prior. And he thought maybe that would entice me.
And when I told him that his furious reactions were inappropriate and overblown, he said that I made him this way and wouldn't get to control his feelings now ✨
Funny how everything tracks
Iam glad is now an ex. I hope you can heal from that experience.
My ex would text me every half hour if I was out with friends, especially men. He would say “fine I’ll let you hang out with them” in a joking tone but it really wasn’t a joke. So glad you got out. In January it’ll be a year since I escaped.
I hope she wakes up and divorces him. He is not a good husband to her. I know she desperately wants to be a "Affleck" so she can say she is related to a movie star, but girl, it isn't worth it. 😅 I don't know how she can be friends with girls who all have amazing husbands and not realize how toxic her husband is.
"Getting divorced and breaking up a temple marriage is a very big deal within Mormonism" and being a swinger... isn't??
exmormon here: being a swinger is definitely a big no no in today's mormon culture. the show just doesn't portray it like it really is.
Daughter of an ex-mormon here who has LDS siblings: I've always thought it was so wild how much plastic surgery and work LDS women get but when I make a pot of coffee and offer it to the whole room, they look at me as though I've just offered everyone heroine. 😂
Nooooo wayyyyy! One of them is the sick baby dancing mom?! I thought she looked familiar but I could have NEVER imagined it was her! That makes me a little upset honestly, that she grew to have such a platform. Yikes!
Oh don't worry she doesn't come across well at all
Which one mom is that?
@@evelinajauniskyte9557Whitney
1:26:39 "You see them being mothers and I don’t know that all of them love to be mothers. They kinda had motherhood thrust upon them once they got married at 18 or younger." SO TRUE!! 😢🤯💔
At the 48min mark can we take a moment to acknowledge the bar for "a good mom" is on the floor for Mormons. Her mom was basically "I'll still love you even if you do something that doesn't affect me in any way except maybe embarrass me." And we all applaud her for it!
I feel like that bar is for a lot of moms outside of mormonism too. At least my mom lol
But it did affect her though. Taylor is venting to her mom and actually involved her mom
@@dynaa4168 emotionally at best love. This doesn't and shouldn't impact her lively hood, having a home, and about anything else
It’s not the bare minimum, it’s just a marker of a healthy relationship. So to have it, despite her religion being so important, shows us the way her mom balances her religion with her parenting. Nobody is saying she is a perfect mom because of that, it’s just an acknowledgment that she handled it well considering her own beliefs.
I’m glass half full and you’re glass half empty though. Technically, it just depends on how you look at it here.
@@kellypaige9322 that is valid
First time viewer/ new sub here: I really never thought I’d gravitate towards ex Mormon content but your breakdown of the drama, the show, these women’s story arch’s and how they do with or against the church is so well spoken and easily digestible. The way you speak scratches a serious itch in my English major brain- concise, but still with context, eloquent, intelligent and entertaining all in one. About to binge the rest of your vid’s now! x
As someone now living in an area with a large population of LDS followers I really felt what you said about Layla probably converting to fit in - and I so appreciate your regular reminders of why that is NOT a good idea
As a former Catholic and former Mormon (I've been through it lol) I always thought it was super interesting how Mormons more or less gatekeep being Mormon. Like Catholics do not care about your activity level or whatever, there are many different types of Catholics, but nobody is fighting to define who can bear that title. Mormons are very much into rules (like on my mission where our motto was "find more rules and obey them exactly") so if you are not following all of them then you lose the right to be Mormon/LDS. It's all or nothing
It’s a trip right?? I was raised Catholic and my husband was raised Mormon and the differences are fascinating! I do think a lot of the diversity (for lack of a better word) in Catholic practice is bc of how big and old it is. You just can’t control 1.3 billion people as easily as 6 million.
It is true that there is a lot of different types of Catholics but there is still a lot of guilt and shaming those who don't do things "correctly". At least in my experience within my family and extended family (so many different churches) there's a lot of shaming to those that don't go to church a certain amount of times, those who get divorced, and a lot of purity culture that has a ton of unwritten rules. I'm sure it's a lot less than how many extreme rules there are for Mormons though. There is definitely gatekeeping within Catholics too, probably to a much lesser degree.
Definitely weird. I was raised Catholic and I've always held the belief that as long as you are baptized in the church, you will always be Catholic (unless you choose to leave). Technically the Catholic religion is also very strict, but I think instead of gatekeeping like Mormons, we kind of go the other way, and anything goes. Like, I don't know anyone who waited til marriage, except maybe my grandma. Most "religious" Catholics I know might just encourage you to church, and will definitely tell you that God will always welcome you back when you're ready.
@@astridmystAs a Catholic, I was shocked to find out that other religions allow divorce! I remember this being a huge issue when my mom left my dad, my dad felt that he was committing a grave sin by signing the divorce papers even though he didn't have much of a choice. Not to mention, I have family members who remarried and weren't allowed to marry in the church the second time
@@plainoolong I completely understand. My parents should be divorced but never will because of their beliefs. It's horrible :/
You asked who’s my favorite character and honestly, I can’t tell most of them apart !
I don’t think I could firmly tell them apart till I had watched about half the show 😭
I still think demi is taylor and vice versa 🤣🤣🤣
I entirely agree. Each one resembles at least two others, and there is overlap between those clusters, so everyone looks like everyone else at least by two degrees of separation. Seems there is at least a bit of common facial structure in (at least the Anglo) LDS population.
@@pineapplepapercraftsI thought Demi and Jessi where the same person
Demi Jessi and Jen literally I can never tell who is who 😂
As a never Mormon and a non-believer by middle school (I was taken to Sunday school and church services nearly every week until I left for college), your content fascinates me. The reasons people hold and follow religious doctrines is such a curiosity to me. I knew I loved your content from the beginning but when you stood in nature and asked/declared "Isn't this enough? This is enough.", I was forever hooked.💕 Looking forward to this one!🙂 Have a terrific weekend, Alyssa!✌️❤️
Whenever I hear “never Mormon” I think of muggles.
@@teenagers012 😂😂❤️
I am Catholic, and I too find it fascinating. I find other religions very interesting
@@teenagers012 That's funny.
@@kelly___3385I’m ex-Catholic. And me too😊
yeah not gonna lie, when they specified connor was talking to women on tinder, i fully went "huh???" 😂 especially because right before she said he was "sexually confused" but maybe thats just mormon talk for engaging in sex/sex content outside the confines of missionary with your spouse .
or maybe she was lying because the only thing worse than a cheating husband is a gay cheating husband
Yea i heard the profile was on grindr
My husband grew up Mormon and when I saw the show pop up on our Disney plus I made him watch it with me and then a lot of things started clicking into place with his family, so, at first I watched for funsies and then it was studing for dealing with his family lol 😂😂
It was so much better than I expected. I am in my early 30's and was born and raised in the SLC valley. My parents left the church before I was born. But most of my family and friends are LDS. There are so many things that were very relatable and I wasn't expecting that. Whitney's behavior is definitely very common for people around here. She can break every rule when she wants to and back stab and judge everyone. But how dare anyone point it out or judge her.
Them wearing identical tracksuits with their names sewn into the front just feels...so weirdly fitting
Might have given them tracksuits in different colour - but maybe that would have been too "rainbowy" ;)
it gave heavens gate vibes to me they did not eat or slay with those outfits
When I hear Mormon Mom, my mind goes straight to Ruby Franke. 😨
And Lori Vallow Daybell 😢
19 kids and counting, not enough Nelson’s, labrants
@@SavannahSedairight !
@@pamelathomas312they are IBLP not LDS ..
@@wildcatblue13 oh all of the ones I mentioned are? My bad lol
Your description of “I gave up enteral life for coffee” made me cackle so loud I instantly subscribed. I will deal with the algorithm giving me morman content for you! 😂❤
Same, it's the perfect description for this channel 😂
You are so right. All of the press photos of these women look like the same woman just with slightly different hair colours and styles.
It’s kind of creepy and really bizarre.
Oh yeah, what’s with the whole “living in Hawaii” thing before returning to Utah?
I’ve watched various channels and have only realised they are Mormon after watching them for way too long 😳
Thank you for commenting on the show about a group of very unhealthy people living a toxic lifestyle in and around a high-demand cult. From my POV, the "beauty standard" depicted in the show is ghoulish, and I feel compassion for the girls and women who develop self-hatred as a result of growing up in this culture.
It's too bad that the indoctrination blinds the women to the fact that, as the bread winners, they don't need to submit or even associate with their king-baby husbands, beyond court-ordered visitation arrangements. They'd be happier and healthier if they were single and supportive of each other.
... wasn't there a "I'm a Mormon" campaign a few years ago? At this point, I think it's safe to say that they're stuck with the consequences of their own choices.
Since it's establishment, the name of the church has always been the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "Mormon" is not a slur; it's just a nickname taken from the Book of Mormon. But a few years ago, members were instructed, and the media was asked, to use the proper name of the church. I think it's because a lot of people were confused about whether members of the faith were Christian or not. Using "Mormon" to describe members of the church today isn't derogatory, but it is indicative of the disconnect between the actual church and the media hype. Any respectable news outlet or documentary will use the proper name of the church.
Since @@cinderbelle22didn't answer your question, yes, there was a huge I'm a Mormon campaign for like a decade. The reason the name changed is because the current prophet tried to change the name in the 90s before he was prophet and was scorned by the prophet at that time. He waited literal decades to finally get back at him haha. Google something along the lines of "Gordon b Hinckley vs Russell M Nelson Mormon"
There was - Brandon Flowers (lead singer for the Killers) did a stint for it.
It's Nelson being petty about being told no 30 years ago
Yes but iirc the current prophet has a known history of hating the word Mormon so he made this change. It’s so petty that I don’t know how anyone can take it seriously. 😅
Licensed esthetician - “aesthetician” means nothing. Your esthetician shoukd NEVER be doing ANYTHING with nitrous oxide unless they are a nurse practitioner or a nurse under a doctors watch and insurance
Swinging is also very common in evangelicalism. My personal experience with it was in Pentecostalism, which is a similarly restrictive/extreme lifestyle to Mormonism, especially when it comes to purity culture. I went to an Xian school for 10 years growing up, and a friend of mine’s parents ended up divorcing because the husband left the wife for someone they were swinging with. They were definitely *not* the only swingers involved with the church/school.
My great grandma always described her and her family as “Jack Mormons.” Great Grandma always needed a cup of coffee, and many of them drank.
@@wildchild5955 😱😅😂
My mom's side call themselves jack-mormons.
this is the term I'm familiar with being born in utah
What is Jack mormon?
Jack Mormon here, it means you get invited to all the parties you get to wear tank tops drink coffee and drink alcohol and you don't have to pay tithing it's the best Mormon to be if you are going to be Mormon.
I was 16 and married to a 21 year old mormon man in Arizona because my mother signed off on it, and then I couldn't get it annulled because I had a baby, couldnt get divorced for 7 years because he wouldn't sign
Omg!
i’m so sorry :(
This just seems like human trafficking. I'm so sorry for what you went through.
I'd be interested in finding the diabetes figures for Mormons. Instead of coffee, tea and beer they guzzle gallons of soda and tons of sugary cookies, etc.
@@jeffsaxton716 I don't
Utah seems to have a 9% percent of diabetics so I feel like it's quite high 😂
@@jeffsaxton716 So it's better to drink beer than soda?
@@ItsBacon-_-neither
Your analysis is by far the best I've heard. Why? Because you included the Mormon rules and standards that make a Mormon "worthy" (especially "temple worthy), in a typical ward, and showed that none of these women live up to those standards. I think this is a very important aspect that shouldn't be ignored, because if viewers think "this isn't sooo bad," or "they aren't culty at all," they need to know that this isn't representative of what it really is/was for most of us TBMs who did everything the leaders told us do, fearing that not doing so would mean losing out on the celestial kingdom, and losing our eternal families.
so many “reaction” and “analysis” videos of shows and things skim right over the top, thank you for going into depth and detail on the context and show, it goes a long way ❤
Maybe I'm just too east coast for this but every time Alyssa says Mom-Tok I hear Montauk lol
Right? I thought the same thing
I do too and I'm Australian. Although it's closer to Mon-Tac to my ears
Same!!!
Me too and I’m an Appalachian hillbilly!
I’m European & I constantly thought they were going away to the Hamptons for a weekend
Yes! I love your videos Alyssa! I left a strict Christian cult years ago and I’m still sorting through how it affected me. Your videos have really helped me. Thank you for making these! ❤
Thank you for watching :) I've found it so helpful to learn from other people's stories, so I am really happy to hear my videos can do the same for others.
Me finding out the church has a trademark on Mormon but won’t let you call them that 😤🤚🏼
Great recap and commentary! Thank you ❤
love you lorry🌸
Watching this show + your recap as a Christian is so interesting. There are (obviously) spiritual parallels between Mormonism and Christianity, but the pipeline of strict faith to equally strict real life behavior in Mormonism seems outlandish to me😅 I’m as spiritually devout as Jen, but nowhere near as conservative. I just find it fascinating how differently Christians vs Mormons go about their daily lives.
Non Mormon but live in Utah and love your videos! My partner and I tried watching this show last night and only made it about 15 min in and realized it was a bit too drama-y for us. But I was still curious about all that happens in it so I’m glad you make this video!
That’s my feeling bout reality TV in general: too much drama and secondhand embarrassment! I find it all to be too much! Commentary like this is about as far as I can go.
Way to go Alyssa!! Thanks for reminding us that editing and directing any series can predetermine our own reactions to any character. Drama needs to be introduced for ratings. So thanks for pulling back the curtain on the basic techniques in which shows are produced. Nothing is without some bias. Each viewer will bring their own reaction to it.
As a lifelong Catholic from Latin America I just have to say this is fascinating. Utah must be one interesting place. Also, TH-cam now thinks I am a Mormon 😂😭 watching this has ruined my feed
She really take this job seriously. A lot of effort put in. Always like just to listen to your ideas and way of looking at things. 💎
Girl, I haven’t watched the show, and stumbled upon your video. That I watched, in its entirety. You SLAY, kept my attention the whole time, amazing job!
The controlling blond husband just looks too much like the crazy religious guy in the movie Contact that blows the machine up.
OMG you're totally right!
He looks like the sister wives dude, the POS that barely cares about all of his kids and wives except for Robin (can't remember his name)
As a practicing Catholic I didn't love the way Jen made Catholic baptism sound super trivial.
The process of baby baptism for Catholics is a serious thing. It's not in someone's living room.
Also we drink alcohol - literally - as part of Mass. 😂😂😅
I’m not even a practicing catholic anymore and I yelled at the screen “not cool Jen” 😂
As an ex catholic, the idea of normie male family members (as opposed to priests) “blessing” the baby is silly. But there are lots of silly things that Catholics do too
Katy, They do not understand Catholic sacramental Baptism
@@32Theresai’ve never heard of anyone who’s not a priest blessing or baptizing anyone & it being considered valid in catholicism or even christianity as a whole
Right, her thinking a sacrament done by someone who studied theology at an accredited university for years with a master's degree at minimum, appointed by a bishop who most likely holds a ph d, is not more but less formal than a group hug by men, where the only requirement is being a man lmfaoooo 😂😂😂😂
I grew up in Gilbert, AZ which has a large LDS population (I lived across the street from the Gilbert temple lol) so watching this was WILD! The fact the allowed filming at the baby blessing was very interesting as well as the garment issue! Ugh I could watch 100 seasons this is anthropology.
Fellow Gilbert gal here!! I had literally the exact same thoughts. Had to binge the whole series as fast as humanly possible lol
That’s where Lori Vallow put one over on the police after she had her husband murdered.
Can we just talk about the intro and how they all look like Gilead Wives from the Handmaid's Tale? Coincidence? I think not 🤔
Underrated comment
The best, and really only, advice my mom gave me in regards to marriage was to never ever say the word Divorce, unless you really mean it. Don't carelessly throw it out in anger, frustration, or during a fight etc, because once you say it and put the idea out there, you can't take it back. I'm not saying divorce shouldn't be an option, but just throwing it around without appreciating the weight and gravity behind what it actually would mean is a very slippery slope and insidious thing to introduce into your marriage.
It hurts my heart to see that one girls husband kinda toss around this idea of divorcing her when she does things he doesn't like. It's just not something you should weaponize against your spouse, the one person who you're supposed to love, protect, and cherish the most. My husband and I are by no means perfect, and no matter how hard we try we can still say things in anger that are most definitely unkind and below the belt at times, but that specifically is just something we promised eachother in the beginning that we wouldn't do, and honestly I think it really is the most simple but best advice I ever got.
🙏
He's definitely an abuser. He's saying it to control her.
It saddens me that these peoples lives are ruled by rules that have no real basis. I see so many people living disingenuous lives full of sadness...just because some guy looked at rocks in a hat and declared it.
They live every moment just for the unpromised (and not even likely) chance that mormons are right and they'll go to the 💫🌟Celestial kingdom🌟. Instead of enjoying earth and all the beautiful things here, like coffee and normal underwear.
@@antichrist4449 Same! Amen 🙏🏼
@@antichrist4449 interesting that those things are considered so beautiful
Cotton normal underwear truly is such a beautiful thing ❤
@@JanetFrisby-wl6zb you missed the point, hun. The point was that those strict rules are keeping people from having a perfectly fine life for no reason. There's nothing particularly beautiful in an average pair of panties or briefs, but if someone told me to spend a hot mid-summer day in basically two sets of clothes instead of just shirt, shorts and underwear, I'd start regard slim panties as a beautiful invention by the end of the day. And even in colder seasons, having the garments bunch up under regular clothes would drive a lot of people insane, even without the daily life stress.
Like ... the beauty isn't in the things itself, but in how they impact your life. There's nothing "beautiful" about a clean, functioning toilet, but after spending a week on festival camping grounds you'll find yourself in awe of very basic things 😂
@Iamthatis137 I don't think they believe it. They are basically secular but don't drink alcohol. The underwear is not that big a deal. It's optional.
Almost every reality show is, in fact, scripted. Some have loose scripts where the situations are written beforehand and the participants have some liberty to decide how to follow through with the initial setup, some leave nothing to chance. The participants know that if they act reasonably and treat others kindly they will get little to no exposure after the editors choose the scenes to keep. Also, the participants usually have to sign non-disclosure agreements that will make them lose their houses if they disclose secrets. Get entertained, but do not believe a word of what is shown in a reality show.
Absolutely!! Almost everything is in reality TV is scripted, and a lot of time the film editors will completely scrap any apologies, reconciliations, or explanations to make people look even worse! 😳
lifelong athiest teen here! I love your videos (to the continued confusion of my generally atheist family and friends as i recite the problems of the Mormon church). Really loved watching the FLDS vid as well! Keep educating and having fun!
I live in a very secular country and all my family and friends are atheist (who also grew up atheist) and my favorite part of consuming this content is the confusion in people faces when I tell them about it 😂
This was one of the most thorough and well thought out videos about this show, I appreciate the effort you put into it! (Especially as someone who has no plans for watching it themselves)
I live in Utah, was born into a Mormon family but escaped via CPS, and live in Utah atm. This is the only way I'll be watching this 😂 Thank you for your sacrifice!
Ok
One thing as an exmo and former convert I never understood about garments was: where does the post partum pad go? And, by extension, where does the monthly pad (for those who use it) go? Getting pregnant was the thing that started the downline to my self excommunication lol
When I was active, I’d just stick the pad down where it would go in a pair of panties and hope for the best. With carinessa (the tighter-fitting polyester knit material) bottoms it worked okay, but if I wore drisilque (the silky, looser fit material), game over. The pad would be hanging down, rubbing between my thighs after a few minutes. It was SO uncomfortable. With either fabric I’d wind up getting blood on the bottoms no matter what I did. Garments made an already uncomfortable time even worse.
I stopped wearing garments shortly after having my first baby. Two years later the feeling of normal underwear still makes me so very happy that I’m free.
As an autistic non mormon I can't even stomach the thought of having to wear long unbreathable polyester underwear under clothes and even during post pardum. That would be my personal hell.
@@juliannehannes11 I really can’t imagine how much worse it would be for someone with sensory issues. The day after I was endowed in the temple (the ceremony which starts a members’ garment-wearing life) I sat on the floor and cried and cried. I hated them so much; they were uncomfortable and I felt uglier than I’d ever felt. Not to mention the endowment ceremony was so creepy that all the warning sirens in my brain were going off, but the conditioning was forcing it away… anyway. I despise garments and feel so much resentment that I spent over a decade wearing them.
@@juliannehannes11 i am also autistic and I can absolutely confirm those fears.
@@agentcallisto So you're not wearing the garments from childhood? I thought you were raised on the garments and it was all you knew. That's even more cruel, to go from normal underwear for 18yrs then suddenly to ill fitting long johns. I am so sorry. What do mormons with Eczema do? Do they have cotton garments?
I was watching the show last night and literally thought I can’t wait until Alyssa reviews this… opened TH-cam and saw you posted this 2 hours ago! 😂
the way zac immediately flipped out and started with threats against jen because of the chippendales show is a HUGE red flag 🚩I can’t imagine allowing my partner to talk to me like that… and she put his ass through school? girl, you need a sense of self worth, STAT
The way she seemed so embarrassed of her own mother was such a shame too
I think it’s often understated how someone rebelling against a religion this oppressive can really mean you lose your family, your entire community, everything you’ve known and be left alone with a child in a world you don’t know well without any support or connections. It’s such a complicated situation and these people are so young.
This is what I was thinking for most of the show. These women are so vulnerable to being cut off from all resources and support, idk why they are being told to rebel.
Former member myself, I resonated with a LOT of your points. You took the words out of my mouth
Im so sat for this. LOVED your take in the short clip you shared about how it shows the consequences of Mormonism on real women and their lives.
It KILLED me that everyone else's names in their talking heads said their first names and Jen's was Jen Affleck every time. We geeeeet it, gurl.
It's really important to note, Chippendales is VERY different from a strip club. Also, note that Zac(h)(k) gambled away the school money his parents gave him. So it's not like he's just casually gambling. He clearly has a problem
Also, Jen did an interview with Vulture, published earlier this week, in which she says she and Zac have been in therapy since the show and "if this relationship continues....". Sounded to me like she's about 50-50 on the prospect now.
@@O2life he is the true villain of the show. Whitney is like a housewives villain. He is an actual villain
@@CorndogKatieyes! I saw Whitney as an atagonist but Zac and Dakota as
actual villians. I felt like fleeing and saving the women everytime they were on screen
@@AgingStudenthe is Spencer Pratt
The law is they can legally be married as young as 14 in Utah with parental permission, but cannot legally consent to sexual acts until 16. At 16, they can legally consent to sexual acts with someone up to 6 years and 364 days their senior.
The fact that the conservatives keep screaming ‘protect the children’ from lgbtqia+ ‘groomers’ when so many states allow child marriages is so sickening
Eww that's so specific. I wish I could go back to ten seconds ago when I didn't know this lol
@@jessjess23brooks89same
Oh you know a rich/connected pedophile was caught and they changed the law to protect him
It’s still morally wrong. Every state has different guidelines for OBVIOUS reasons and it’s disgusting.
You’re the best. Old school, “ex-Mormon” here and I have been obsessed with your IG! Your analysis is almost identical to mine!
Also, when you posted about temple “stuff”, my jaw was on the ground!!!
I learned so much through this video that I didn't get while watching the show, as I am not very familiar with LDS. I wondered what garments Jen forgot and just thought she didn't bring any clothes for the trip. 😅
Thank you very much for giving so much background information to really understand the show and the important issues it is adressing!
Mormons not liking their name mean they know that lot's of people heard about how cultish it is
It’s just rebranding right? Same drama new name?
@@kobochaosyup 😂
@@kobochaosSame Book of Mormon. New cover.